“Lyoto should have maybe moved around a little more; he got caught up in the moment,” Soares told MMAjunkie.com (www.mmajunkie.com). “But no excuses. It was ‘Shogun’s’ night, and he deserves to be a champion.”

In the rematch of their hotly contested UFC 104 affair, Rua landed a well-timed right to Machida’s temple and then followed the former title holder to the ground with more strikes and forced a KO stoppage at the 3:35 mark of the opening round.

When Machida finally returned to his feet several moments later, his left eye had swollen massively. Soares said Machida went to the hospital on Saturday night to address the injury, though the final determination on whether surgery will be required has yet to be made.

“He does have a slight hairline fracture, and the reason why it puffed up is the doctor said there was air that got in, and that’s why it fills up,” Soares said. “You have almost like a seal with your orbital, and when you have a little hairline fracture and you blow your nose, it just fills up with air. That’s what ended up happening.

“It’s nothing too major. He may have to have surgery; he may not. It’s up in the air right now.”

Soares said Machida returned to Brazil today and will take some time off to heal before returning to training.

“I’m no doctor, but I’d assume he’s probably going to have go at least 60 to 75 days without contact,” Soares said. “Then he can start training again.”

While the wounds will eventually heal, what about Machida’s psyche? After he opened his career with 16 straight victories, it’s easy to imagine that suffering his first career defeat in such emphatic fashion could certainly take a toll on Machida’s confidence.

Soares believes the opposite is true.

“Lyoto’s not totally crushed,” Soares said. “He’s upset, of course. You lose the belt; you get knocked out – but this is the fight game. One of the things that Lyoto says is that this is the beautiful thing about our sport: anything can happen. Saturday night was ‘Shogun’s’ night.

“Look what happened with Georges St-Pierre. He got beat by Matt Serra, and he came back even better. I think that’s going to happen with Machida, too. I really believe that’s going to happen.”

That rebuilding process will be overseen by Lyoto’s father, Yoshizo. In fact, Soares said the project began in the locker room following the fight.

“We were in the locker room, and everyone was a little bit down, and Lyoto looked at his dad,” Soares said. “His dad said, ‘You’re a samurai – on to the next. That’s in the past now. You lost; oh, well. You went out there, and you fought. You tried to do what you could do, and it didn’t work out this time. Go back to the drawing board, come up with a better strategy, and life moves on.'”

Bringing together Black House

Machida’s loss was the latest in a series of frustrating events for some of Soares’ clients. UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva was widely panned for his UFC 112 win, and former UFC and PRIDE champ Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira suffered a high-profile loss to Cain Velasquez at UFC 110.

Soares also represents Jose Aldo, Rafael “Feijao” Cavalcante, Junior Dos Santos, Andre Galvao and Antonio Rogerio Nogueira, among others, and he hopes the recent difficulties actually can bring his stable of fighters closer together through training in Brazil and at Black House in Los Angeles.

“We talked on the phone with Anderson Silva and everyone else, and I think we’re going to start seeing all of our guys spend a lot more time together,” Soares said. “I really believe that we represent the best guys in the world, and I think that each of them are very strong as individuals, but I think they’re even stronger as a team. They’ve kind of been a little bit sporadic as to when they train together.

“I think together, everyone’s experience – from Anderson’s experience to Rodrigo and Rogerio’s experience to Lyoto’s experience – when you all put it together, it’s a good recipe for success.”

Soares said it’s too early to tell exactly when Machida will return to the cage, but he believes another appearance by the end of the year isn’t out of the question.

And while he realizes a third meeting between his client and Rua isn’t likely to occur anytime soon due to the convincing nature of the victory, Soares does believe Machida and “Shogun” will compete again.

“Lyoto will fight anybody,” Soares said. “I don’t think the UFC will give us the rematch right now simply because the first fight was a close fight, but this one was a lot more decisive. There’s no doubt that ‘Shogun’ won this one. The first fight, I still believe that ‘Shogun’ lost that fight, 3-2, but it was a close fight. Who wouldn’t like a rematch? But I just think that there’s other fights that the UFC would probably put together.

“Whatever the UFC thinks is fine, but we definitely want to get on that horse and get back in there again and get back to winning ways.”

In the meantime, despite the difficult loss for his client, Soares said he truly is impressed by the UFC’s new light-heavyweight champion.

“Even though I wish Lyoto still had the belt, it makes me happy to see that ‘Shogun’ got there,” Soares said. “He worked hard. He had his dream, and it was his night that night. Now it’s 1-1, and I don’t think this is the last time that we’re going to see a Shogun-Machida fight.

“Hats off to ‘Shogun.’ He’s a good guy, and I think he’s going to be a great champion. He’s a good person, and I wish him nothing but good luck.”

With nothing but praise for the man that vanquished his client, Soares said he looks forward to seeing how Machida responds to the challenge of trying to make his way back up the 205-pound ladder.

“Lyoto got his first loss now, and I think it’s kind of a little bit of a pressure release,” Soares said. “But in a weird way, I think Lyoto is going to learn a lot from this. He’s going to learn more from losses than he does wins, and I think he’s
going to come back a better, stronger Machida.”

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